Unravelling Malaysia’s self driving TBMs

UK-based New Civil Engineer magazine speak to Gamuda’s Justin Chin Jing Ho and Ng Hau Wei about the inception of the world’s first autonomous tunnel boring machine in the Klang Valley Mass Rapid Transit projects and future developments.

Article excerpt published with permission from author, Ty Bird and NCE editor, Claire Smith. 

Ground breaking development in Malaysia of autonomous tunnelling – tunnel boring machines without operators – is reinforcing international recognition of the emerging ‘Asian Century’.

Politicians, economists and cultural analysts are forecasting that Asia will rise to pre-eminence in the 21st century and – on evidence provided by Kuala Lumpur, Malaysia’s fast expanding capital – they could be right. The city has turned itself into a hotbed of tunnelling expertise and is now among world leaders in the application of tunnel boring technology.

A pointer to this was given at last December’s New Civil Engineer Tunnelling Festival in London. There, Malaysian contractor MMC Gamuda won the Innovation in Tunnel Excavation Award. It had entered its autonomous tunnel boring machine system (A-TBM) and prevailed over five European contenders.